


dream

by aeicx



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, One-Shot, maybe a series of one-shots in the future?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-13
Updated: 2017-04-13
Packaged: 2018-10-18 06:24:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10611084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeicx/pseuds/aeicx
Summary: Zarya reaches up to thread her fingers through her own hair, pushing the strands away from her face. “I do not blame you,” she says. “You are not the first woman to find my hair so captivating. It is quite the sight for sore eyes, as the saying goes.”





	

On top of the two grueling hours spent sorting out misprinted patient files with Winston, patching up Lena’s knee and relieving Fareeha’s shoulder after their commission to Ilios had taken a bit longer than Mercy had hoped.

As though to supplement the influx of muscle injuries, she stands upright and winces, feeling her own shoulders and neck burn upon relinquishing her once hunched position. While the hours had grown in number, her own capacity for concentration had seemed to dwindle—Winston, on the other hand, remains unmoving, gaze fixed on the monitor as he scans remnants of once-confidential files extracted from former Blackwatch archives.

“I think...” she begins slowly, pushing her chair back into place, “I’m going to retire for the night. Would you like me to look at anything else before I go?”

A slight pause accents his response. “Hm? Oh. No, I don’t think so. Thank you,” Winston says, finally spinning around to face her. He smiles. “I’ll take it from here.”

Mercy nods. “Get some rest, please.”

“All right. Night, Angela.”

“Sleep well.”

She makes her way out the exit with a stretch and glances at her watch—11:51 PM. Reaching her own quarters requires something of a long walk; fortunately, getting to the lab to grab some files takes a mere brisk stroll on the way to her room. As she nears the entrance, the doors slide open.

The click of Mercy’s heels pierce the static hum of the laboratory. It’s already well-lit, rather than dimmed to blackness as it would be in her absence. She scans the width of the room somewhat hesitantly.

“Who’s there?”

Cautious steps.

"...Aleksandra?" she mutters.

Sure enough, as she rounds the cabinets, a familiar disarray of shockingly hot pink surfaces into view; followed by a thick set of blue armor (fashioned by none other than Mercy herself), curled into an oddly winded position on the couch as the unexpected guest slumbers soundly.

Mercy chuckles. This would count as only one of many instances in the past couple weeks that Zarya has taken the time to swing by her office—to seek aid, at first, regarding a sore wrist or two that had interfered with her regular lifting during her free time. Then it had been to ask if Mercy had had lunch, as it had been 2 PM and quite the busy day thus far, and why, what a coincidence, I haven’t eaten yet either, doctor, why don’t you take a break and come join me? Only to be followed by yet another visit, to see if Mercy would have liked to enjoy some coffee in the afternoon, as thanks for saving her so many times during their last mission...

Forget four or five visits in the past two weeks. How many times has Zarya dropped by in the past month? The past two months? It’s become such a regular occurrence that the mere thought of keeping count only draws farther from Mercy’s mind with each stay.

Now, she stands paused with bated breath, watching as Zarya lays on her side—back pressed against the couch cushions, resting her head against her arm as the other hand falls contentedly on her waist.

Mercy’s knees seem to move by their own nature, without a second thought. She bends down slowly, careful to delay the collision between her skin and the floor in fear of stirring the sleeping soldier.

To her recollection, Mercy has heard Lena and Hana remark on Zarya’s condition of sleep on multiple occasions (“ _You_ do it, I’m never gonna wake her up again, no way”) and laughed. Everything about Zarya seems to be reflective of the essence of her being in every which way—there is nothing unpredictable about her, as Jack had once said, and yet her temperament seems to demand the shock, if not mirth, from everyone within a surrounding five mile radius.

 _She sleeps like a rock,_ she thinks. She brushes her hand against a cluster of pink hair, away from Zarya’s eyes and nose.

Her eyes.

_Such lovely eyes..._

Mercy’s face warms. The peak of her conscience delays the next stroke of Zarya’s hair, and Mercy remotely wonders if it would be fine, if she herself would be unbothered to be watched like this in her sleep. To have someone gaze at her, and wonder of what dreams she’d be having; to have someone reach out, and dare to touch her hair or brush gently along her jaw, just maybe...

Warm, foreign fingers suddenly wrap around her own, holding them at the junction between Zarya’s ear and jawline. Mercy’s heart stops.

“ _С добрым утром_ ,” Zarya murmurs, and her eyes are so very open and so very, very blue, and she is so very, very awake in this moment in time. A lock of pink hair falls over the space just between her eyes, and she tightens her hold on Mercy’s hand and _smirks_. “Were you enjoying yourself, doctor?”

Mercy opens her mouth, closes it, and opens it again. Her cheeks are positively burning—she feels a hand rest against her lower back and jolts—

Zarya laughs. The sound is shameless and blithe, almost smug; she clicks her tongue in a series of _tsk tsk_ s and pulls Mercy even closer. “You thought I was a heavy sleeper, didn’t you?” Her voice is low, almost something of a hum, and the feel of her breath against Mercy’s ear sends a fleeting shiver running down her back. When she finally pulls away, she sees that Zarya is grinning.

“I—I didn’t mean—“ Mercy stammers, but her tongue seems to have wrapped itself in a knot. What could she possibly say? _I didn’t mean to watch you while you were sleeping? I didn’t mean to run my fingers through your hair, it was purely for research and I was curious as to how it would aid my studies for the future?_

Zarya reaches up to thread her fingers through her own hair, pushing the strands away from her face. “I do not blame you,” she says. “You are not the first woman to find my hair so captivating. It is quite the sight for sore eyes, as the saying goes.”

Mercy rolls her eyes. The ensuing huff of exasperation draws her pulse back to a milder pace—whereas she had been so sure her heart would beat out her chest only seconds ago—and she wrinkles her nose. “Once you’ve boasted to your heart’s content, I’d like to ask why you decided to take a nap in my lab at,” she casts a cursory glance at her wristwatch, “12:02 in the morning? If you were even taking a nap, that is,” she adds with a frown, and Zarya chuckles.

“I was waiting for you, of course,” she replies, and her tone is streaked with pride. “Woke up just before you walked in.”

“Any particular reason?”

“I wanted to give you this." Zarya sits up straight and shuffles through her pockets.

When said item is retrieved, Mercy blinks: it’s a carbon fiber box, small enough to fit in her hand, lined with a glowing gold ridge around the middle. The other woman gives her a pointed look and Mercy thinks—for a fraction of a second—that she sees a trace of anxiety flit across Zarya’s face before opening the gift.

A jagged charm gleans in the lighting of the laboratory, held up to either edge of the box by a thin chain. The simple, metallic piece is roughly shaped to make out the silhouette of a staff interwoven by two serpents, topped off by a pair of wings; _of course,_ Mercy thinks, and she reaches out to touch and feels the corners of her mouth twitch, slowly enveloping the entirety of her expression in a soft smile.

“A caduceus.” Her tone is nothing if not amused, yet tender all the same. “How typical.”

“Ah, but you are mistaken,” Zarya says, shaking a finger in Mercy’s face. “It may be a classic, but this gift here that I present to you is unlike any other.”

“Is that so?” Zarya nods.

“It may not be decorated with, say, diamonds or countless crystals, but it is crafted from a very durable metal called _titanium,_ made to withstand any chaos as you fly from one person to the other on our missions.”

“This is beautiful, Aleksandra. How did you know?”

“Hm?”

“That I’d lost my old one.”

“As a matter of fact,” Zarya replies in her matter-of-fact tone, “Oxton and Athena confirmed that you had lost your last necklace in battle, years ago in the midst of a very heated battle.”

“Actually, it fell down the drain in my sink a few months ag—“

“Never mind that, _ангел,_ ” Zarya says passively. She pulls the necklace from the container and undoes the clasp rather swiftly. Mercy takes a good three seconds to wonder, really, how someone with hands so coarse and large can breeze through fingering such a minute mechanism (most likely from experience), before she feels a pair of arms fall over her head from behind. The caduceus glints above her collarbones as Zarya’s fingers work gently against the back of her neck. Once the necklace is fastened, Mercy turns around, rubbing the ornament between her fingers and gazing down in admiration.

“Thank you.” She means every word. When she looks up, she sees that Zarya is beaming.

“Happy birthday, Angela.”

**Author's Note:**

> song of the day: ♪ 미행 (그림자; Shadow) ♫ - f(x)


End file.
